Trouble Understanding
by Leonew
Summary: Devon decides to go along with Danziger on a scouting trip. But just how good an idea is that? Takes place right after Flower Child. DD, please Read and Review. Rating for mild violence, language and injuries in Ch. 2.
1. Coming Along

Disclaimer: I do not own the series of Earth 2. If I did, I would have made it continue. I'm also not making any profit out of this story.

* * *

Annoyed, John Danziger discovered she was following him once again. She hadn't given him a single moment of peace after the flower-incident. He realised she was worried about him, that she wanted to prevent him from putting himself in danger again. The thought touched him more then he wanted to admit, but he was also irritated by her persistency to follow him with every little thing he did. Was she really thinking that her coming along would prevent anything on this unpredictable planet?

'You're coming along Adair?' he asked, hiding his irritation.

She shifted her rucksack some higher on her back and simply nodded. She tried to catch his eye, see what his reaction was. He looked away, still not showing any sign of an emotion whatsoever.

'I figured two pair of eyes can see more than one. Together we might find a road broad enough for the Transrover.' She obviously had a sudden urge to explain herself.

'Okay, right.' Danziger answered flatly.

* * *

Devon was a little taken aback by his lack of response. It certainly wasn't like Danziger to let things pass by like that. She knew he felt cross at being watched all the time. She also knew that she wouldn't be able to foresee any of the dangers of this planet and probably wouldn't be able to constantly protect him from them. But Danziger had become a valuable friend to her and she wanted to silence her fears by at least trying to keep thing under control. She had been shocked by what almost happened to Bess and what also could have happened to him.

Devon Adair hated to be out of control. This planet made her feel like she was though. It kept reminding her constantly of what all could go wrong. It was bad enough with one person, her son, to care about and now she felt responsible for this man as well. And she couldn't even tell him that. She was probably only making him feel like a little child being mothered.

* * *

Danziger felt like a little child being mothered. Devon wouldn't even let him go alone on a simple scouting trip. She probably thought he wouldn't be able to take care of himself. Admittedly, he had run into quite some troubles in the five months they had spent on G889. He had been lost several times, almost died of thirst, been trapped in some spidery tunnel, shot by a ZED, possessed by an ancient Terrian spirit and, of course, been drugged by a dangerous flower. But all that hadn't been _his _fault. Well…okay, maybe he had been a little irresponsible every now and then.

Danziger sighed as they continued to walk on through the quiet woods, he didn't want to be seen as some stupid immature-acting man, especially not by Devon.

His thoughts were interrupted as he saw Devon suddenly stagger, then stumble.

'Are you all right?' he asked as he offered her a hand.

'Fine.' She answered shortly, briskly patting some leaves from her jacket. She gave him a small, reassuring smile and, before Danziger knew what was going on, he felt his knees go weak.

'_What am I doing? Stop it John, you can't let yourself get such feelings for her.' _he mentally reprimanded himself.

He felt himself getting more and more annoyed for different reasons now. When Devon stumbled once again he unwillingly snapped at her. 'Look Adair, if you can't keep up the pace you'd better stay behind at the camp and stop bothering me!'

She gave him a hurt and offended look, making him immediately feel sorry.

'Err, I'm sorry…' he said uncomfortably. He once again offered her his hand but she ignored it this time and got up on her own.

'Well, what are you waiting for?' she called back as she walked away and he didn't attempt to follow her. 'We have to find a way out of this area and the sooner we do this, the better.'

He was still standing there, Devon halted. 'What's wrong? Got tired?' she scorned.

'No… It's just, that's the way we came from. You might want to go this way if you want to make any progress.'

The look she gave Danziger as she passed him was one to make even the bravest man shrivel up from fear. But John Danziger had gotten used to it; she had used it too many times on him. So he decided to ignore it and follow her.

He too hoped they would very soon be able to find a suitable path. They had lingered at the Winter Camp for way too long. They would never reach New Pacifica if they kept going at this pace. Luckily, it was now finally becoming spring –thanks to Bess and Morgan- and they most likely wouldn't have to worry about getting stuck in the snow anymore. If now they only would get through this huge forest.

Suddenly, the small path they were walking started to rise sharply.

'I don't think we are going to find a good path here.' John observed. 'It will be way too steep anyway.'

'Maybe.' Devon responded, 'But we might also have a good view on the forest from the top.'

'If there _is _a top.' John panted a good deal of climbing later. Devon was also breathing heavily and she looked quite pale. Danziger figured she was feeling a bit under the weather and might have a flu coming up or something.

She stopped so sudden he bumped into her and was rewarded with yet another irritated look. He had lost count of the number of _looks _she had given him that day. _'Guess I'm extra annoying today.' _

As he stepped from behind her to see what had made her stop, he was blinded by the sharp light. They had reached the three-line and were exposed to the brightly shining sun. Danziger looked up to a vivid blue sky with thin veils of clouds, as on a summer's day. But at the same time, a cold breeze wiped away all such illusions.

But he noticed Devon wasn't looking at the sky. She was looking to her right, where a broad view on the landscape revealed itself. From the mountains, which were rising up above them, a calm river came flowing down. It had searched its way through a broad valley and further on, through the forest. Danziger turned to see it make a wide curve right at the feet of the mountain they had started to climb on. Some further away he saw it flowing not to far to the east from their camp, which was barely visible from their position, hidden between the trees. The river too disappeared from sight in the distance, where the forest stretched out to the horizon.

'Well, we already knew this forest was immense. We can't just get around it, no. We have to get _through _it.' he spoke.

Devon didn't seem to be hearing him. 'Do you think that river is shallow enough for the Transrover to ride through it?'

Danziger gave her a doubtful look. 'I don't know Adair; we may have to check it out.' He shook his head, 'But even then, we still have to find a way _to _it.'

'Well, we can always try. We still have plenty of daytime left to walk down there.'

The tall man sighed and gave in. There was no way he would be able to argue against Devon Adair. He would never win and in the end he always found himself being dragged along anyway. Still, he was having his doubts about going all this far away from the camp all by their selves. There would be no quick help when they'd run into trouble.

The two of them started hiking down to the valley. It was a tricky road, with many loose rocks and slippery mud. They helped each other down a couple of times, silently offering hands at the hardest parts. By the time they had gotten down to a more flat part of the road they both looked like mud monsters. Devon had a particularly big spat of mud on her cheek, making her look quite cute in Danzigers eyes. Of course, he would never actually _say_ such a thing to her. He didn't even dare to imagine the look on her face when he told her she looked _cute_.

'Shall we take a break?' Devon asked him. He saw she was trying to say it casually and to hide her real exhaustion.

'Sure, I'm staring to get a bit tired.' he said subtly.

They both sat down on a different rock, facing the valley that was still a pretty long way down.

'This planet _can _sometimes be beautiful.' Devon pondered.

'Yeah, but I always figure that beautiful things, or women for that matter, are actually the most dangerous.' He winked at her teasingly and enjoyed seeing her turn red and look away.  
'You shouldn't allow it to let it put your guard down.' he muttered to himself as she rummaged through her bag.

After she had taken out a small package, she took something indescribable from it and handed it to him.

'What _is _this?' he asked her, he noticed the thing was feeling quite spongy in his hand.

'It's something I found in the forest earlier. Go ahead, it's edible.'

'How do you know that?' he asked suspiciously.

She sighed, 'Don't worry, I'm not stupid enough to go pick thing in the woods and just try to eat them… I've had Julia test them.'

He observed the thing more closely, 'It looks like some kind of carrot…'

'Yeah,' Devon answered, 'but it was growing above the ground, like some kind of mushroom.' She smiled, 'Maybe we could call it a 'mushrot'.'

Danziger pulled a face, 'That doesn't sound very edible.'

* * *

Devon had always a hard time understanding men. Even her own son Uly was sometimes a mystery to her, though that might also have something to do with his strange connection to the Terrians which had changed him so much. Back at the Stations her confusion about men had been proven most significant in her relationship to her ex-husband. She hadn't understood when he told her he had needed more space. She had wondered inn what way she had been a limitation to his 'space', she was hardly ever there anyway, always at work. She still hadn't figured out his exact reason for leaving but figured several factors may have played a role in it.

Now she was here, on this distant planet, far away from all civilisation with the man she understood least of all. Sometimes she felt like John Danziger was playing with her, teasing her in a way she couldn't stand. At other moments he seemed dead serious, showing her more than he would ever tell by his actions. But there were also times he didn't seem to care at all; he'd act cold towards her, fight her decisions aggressively.

She watched him now as he seemed to examine the 'mushrot', as she had officially called it, and wondered what he was expecting to find out by just looking at it. Then he shrugged and looked back up to her.

'I trust you Adair.' he spoke, making her blush for the second time in a short period, very unlike her.

"_What are you doing to me Danziger?" _Devon almost rolled her eyes at the melodramatic thought. Maybe it wasn't just Danziger who made her act so odd lately, maybe it was also the planet and the strange situation they were in. Part of her was still the same, still very Adair-like, but other things had changed so much she sometimes didn't even recognise herself. She supposed that happened to most members of the Advance crew. _"Yeah, it must be the planet". _she thought, almost convinced.

Pensively she took a small bite of her mushrot just as Danziger also did so. It didn't taste like much, she noticed.

'Well.. I guess it's not too bad.' Danziger told her as he took a bigger bite. Devon watched him chew as she put her own mushrot down. She didn't quite like its taste though Danziger seemed to think differently. Suddenly she had to blink a couple of time as her image of him became blurry. She shook her head as her sight didn't become clear immediately. When it finally did, she saw Danziger go down. He fell sideward from the rock he was sitting on, onto the ground.

'John!' she gasped.

* * *

A/N: I just decided to go write an Earth 2 story, I do not plan to make it a long one though. I'll update as soon as I can.

Please review, it would help me a lot improving my writing.


	2. Laughing

Disclaimer: To say that I own Earth 2 and ever made or will make any profits out of it, would be a plain lie.

* * *

'Alonzo! ALONZO!' Several people looked up in surprise as Julia ran through the camp shouting. The doctor seemed to be totally panicking so Bess Martin quickly came up to her and tried to calm her down.

´What's wrong Julia?' she asked, laying a hand on her shoulder.

Julia stopped but seemed to be looking right through her as she continued looking for Alonzo. Finally, she spotted him at the edge of the camp, where he was busy cleaning up a Mag-pro. He looked up as Julia approached him. 'Hey doc, what's up?' he said, his famous smile plastered on his face. Then he saw Julia's bewildered look and he got more serious.

'I gave them to Devon, but they are dangerous Alonzo! You have to go warn them! They're not answering their gear, what if it's already too late?!' Julia ranted.

'Whoa, calm down there, you're not making any sense.' Alonzo put down the Mag-pro and grabbed Julia softly by the shoulders. Bess looked at the both of them with a questioning look. She too, had absolutely no clue what was going on.

Julia closed her eyes and tried to focus on the situation at hand instead of thinking of the worst possible scenarios. 'Yesterday, Devon came to me with a new kind of plant.' She started calmly, 'We had never seen it before and Devon thought that it might be edible so I decided to test it. Everything looked just fine, but one substance that I have never come across before. I specifically experimented on it to see if it was harmful but all came out safe. So I gave them to Devon to eat for lunch today.' Julia breathed in sharply, 'But just now, I accidentally sneezed over my work and discovered the odd substance reacts to body-fluid. It gets a totally different chemical combination… and turns into a drug!'

* * *

Devon quickly tried to get up but had to sit back down again because of a dizzy spell that got over her.

'_How can this be?' she thought, 'Julia had said the plants were all right.'_

She tried to get up again, slowly this time. Concerned she bent over to Danziger. Her sight was blurry and unsteady. It was only after a few seconds she discovered he was laughing. John Danziger was lying on the ground, giggling like a little girl. The view of it suddenly brought a laugh to her mouth too. Before she knew she was also laughing out loud and lost her balance.

The two of them were lying there laughing for a couple of minutes before Devon managed to get serious again. Her vision still swayed a bit and she was feeling a little light-headed but at least she could control her actions again. She crawled up and sat back on her rock again, leaving Danziger to his own laughing fits. The mushrots weren't making her happy at all anymore, she was more worried now. She didn't want to drag a laughing Danziger all the way to camp and right now he didn't seem like he was going to stop any moment.

'Hey, Danziger, will you stop the idiotic giggling there? We need to move on.' she tried, poking him with her foot.

'Ha-haa….wh-what?' he answered, looking around confused. He didn't really seem to see or notice her and before she knew it he was in another cackling fit, this one even more hysterical than the earlier.

She tried getting angry and grabbed him by the shoulders, shaking him. 'Danziger! I'm telling you I'm gonna _roll _you back down if you won't stop it!' Then she tried slapping his face but this only caused him to laugh even harder. Involuntary a giggle rose up in her throat once more but she shook her head angrily. She actually growled at him before she sat back, rubbing her temples in frustration.

She just sat there for a while, looking down on the valley beneath them. It truly was a beautiful sight. Spring had brought green grasses and coloured flowers all over the place and the sun was reflected in the slowly forth flowing water of the river, making it sparkle brightly. But the shade of the high mountains where marching up towards their end of the valley and Devon noticed she must have sat there quite a long time. The cold breeze had grown stronger and was chilling her to the bone. She also noticed Danziger had finally become quiet; he was now sound asleep, curled up between the rocks.

Devon sighed; she absolutely didn't feel like spending the night here, halfway up a windy hill, with nothing to eat. Maybe Danziger would be acting normal by now, she hoped so. She bent over to him once again and shook him.

'Come on John,' she whispered, 'time to get back to the camp. I'm sure _True _and Uly will miss up by now.' If she had hoped the mention off his daughter would have worked, this hope was soon proven in vain. This time Danziger didn't laugh though. He got angry. _Very _angry.

'I WAS _JUST _TRYING TO GET SOME SLEEP!' he shouted, 'WHAT THE HELL DID YOU WAKE ME UP FOR!? HOW AM I EVER SUPPOSED TO SLEEP IF YOU KEEP BOTHERING ME!?'

Devon quickly jumped back, 'John calm down, I...' But she found no reasonability, let alone calmness, in his eyes. Suddenly he stepped forward and gave her a hard push. Caught off guard, Devon lost her balance and fell backwards. Her head hit a rock hard, knocking her out. She wasn't aware of how she was rolling further and further down the steep hill, how she kept on rolling, hitting more rocks on the way. She wasn't aware how finally, after the terrain got shallower, she got stuck in a prickly bush. And maybe that was for the best.

* * *

John Danziger, however, _was _aware of the woman rolling down the hill until she disappeared out of sight. The unexplainable rage was leaking away quickly and he was aware of more than he had been in hours, though he still felt very foggy. Without actually knowing why he started to trudge down after her. After a while worry started to prickle his mind. She had fallen such a long way. Along with the worry came guilt, he still didn't know why he had pushed her and didn't even remember why he had been so angry in the first place. He tried to think about this but soon discovered that he couldn't concentrate on that and on walking the hill at the same time. He kept tripping over rocks when he tried. Quickly, he focused on his feet again. He just wished the mist in his head would disappear, he wanted to think clearly and remember where he was and how he got there.

Danziger stopped walking when he came to a high ridge. He looked around and saw the body of the woman, lying in a bunch of bushes, about a hundred meters to his right. The ridge became less and less high in that direction until it was but a few feet high. As quickly as possible, Danziger began to walk alongside it. But the path was rough and small, making his progress slow and tiring. He practically fell of the ridge getting down and had to crawl the rest towards his goal. The woman was laying face-down in the bushes. Her clothes and skin were torn and bloody, she wasn't moving. At least, nothing seemed broken but things weren't looking great as it was. Carefully, Danziger turned her around. Her face pale and covered with scratches but still beautiful. Danziger gasped, 'Devon, oh God, I'm so sorry.' He stroked a lock of her brown hair back. He sat with her is his arms for a while but then stood up and started walking, holding her tightly. He had only a vague idea of where he was going but hoped he was heading in the right direction. No longer, had he any eye for his surroundings, he just kept on walking.

First, he travelled along the mountain slope for a while, but he then realised he was taking the long way around and started climbing laboriously. They had gotten to the shady side of the mountain and it was a lot colder there. John felt Devon grow colder so he put her down and draped his coat around her. He gathered his breath for a minute and then picked her up again.

It was only after his feet got soaked that he realised he was walking through snow. Incredulously, he stared at it, wasn't it supposed to be spring now? Hadn't they seen enough snow by now?! In a flash of anger he kicked at the snow, only to slip and land hard on his back. Devon moaned and opened her eyes. She gave the setting a long look, then stared at the panting man underneath her. Then she moaned again and brought a hand to her head with a pained face. 'What have you gotten us in _this _time Danziger?'

The large man spluttered and glared at her. 'What have _I _gotten us into? You were the one who made me eat those mushrots in the first place!'

Then, despite of the situation, they both started laughing.

Alonzo had been searching in vain for the lost Eden Advance members for a couple of hours now. It was getting dark and he was getting very worried in a Julia-like manner. If something really had happened to Devon and John, it would be impossible to find them in this area. Danziger had only given a vague description of where he would be heading this morning and Alonzo was still trudging through the same woods. He was just deciding to take a path to his left when he heard Walman shouting. Alonzo ran in the direction he heard the voice come from and came at a hill. Sprinting up through the bushes, he suddenly bumped into something big and smelly.

'Hey, watch it there Alonzo.' a low voice came and a sweaty hand was stuck out to him. Alonzo grabbed it and was pulled up roughly by a very tired looking Danziger. A few feet away, Devon was standing, supported by Walman, but with a small smile on her lips.

'Bet you thought we had gotten ourselves into trouble again, huh?' she said at the worried expression on his face. Alonzo was surprised by her nonchalance but then cocked an eyebrow as he looked first intently at her, then at Danziger, who was still panting. 'Nooo, of course not. And you two look like you didn't come across any trouble at all.'

Danziger grumbled something undistinguishable and shot a glare at no one in particular. Alonzo just laughed and clapped his shoulder. 'Come on, my friend, let's go get you a bath.'

'Yes,' the other man sighed, 'and something that actually _is _edible.'

* * *

A/N: Bah, I'm not totally content with the end but I already felt guilty about making you all wait this long for the ending (and I bet you were, lol :P) that I couldn't delay it any longer. Well, that was it then, at least _I _enjoyed it. Please review if you have too and do so as well when you haven't.

Oh and a happy New Year to you all!


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